Part 3: Comparison of \u1e5ag-veda<\/i> 10.129 with the Book of Dzyan<\/p>\n
Now that we have what I consider to be an adequate basis for comparison, with the translation choices and the reasons for them explained at length, we may proceed with the comparison of \u1e5ag-veda<\/i> 10.129 with the Book of Dzyan. We should keep in mind that the \u1e5ag-veda<\/i> hymns are poems, not philosophical or scientific treatises. About the handful of \u1e5ag-veda<\/i> hymns that may be considered cosmogonic, C. Kunhan Raja writes (Poet-Philosophers of the<\/i> \u1e5agveda<\/i>, 1963, p. 221):<\/p>\n
\u201cThey are primarily poetry and they are poetry with a philosophical topic. In the other places we have poetry with a philosophical back-ground. We have only poetry in the \u1e5agveda<\/i> and we never have a text book on any philosophical topic.\u201d<\/p>\n
Among the \u1e5ag-veda<\/i> hymns that may be considered cosmogonic, e.g., 10.90 to puru\u1e63a, 10.121 to hira\u1e47ya-garbha, 10.81-82 to vi\u015bva-karman, and perhaps a few others, 10.129 is unique. It gives a more or less straightforward account of cosmogony, without mythology. It therefore provides us with quite the closest comparison from the Vedas to the Book of Dzyan.<\/p>\n
RV 10.129.1<\/b>. [It] was not non-existent, nor was [it] existent then. There was no world, nor sky, [nor] what is beyond. What moved incessantly? Where? In the abode of what? Was [it] water, dense [and] deep?<\/p>\n
\u201cBook of Dzyan,\u201d stanza 1, \u015bloka 6: \u201c. . . the Universe, the son of necessity, was immersed in parini\u1e63panna, to be outbreathed by that which is and yet is not. Naught was.\u201d; 1.8: \u201cAlone the one form of existence stretched boundless, infinite, causeless, in dreamless sleep; and life pulsated unconscious in universal space, . . .\u201d; 3.2: \u201c. . . the darkness that breathes over the slumbering waters of life.\u201d<\/p>\n
In particular, we may compare \u1e5ag-veda<\/i> 10.129.1a, \u201c[It] was not non-existent, nor was [it] existent then,\u201d with the phrase in Book of Dzyan 1.6, \u201cthat which is and yet is not,\u201d which is further clarified in the following stanza 1.7, \u201ceternal non-being\u2014the one being.\u201d For \u1e5ag-veda<\/i> 10.129.1c, \u201cWhat moved incessantly?,\u201d the \u201cincessantly\u201d is only an attempt to render the sense of \u201crepeated\u201d in the intensive verb \u201cmoved,\u201d which sense was rendered by Geldner as \u201cback and forth\u201d (hin und her), by Gonda as \u201cintermittently,\u201d and by Hock as \u201ckept on\u201d moving. The parallel phrase in Book of Dzyan 1.8 is \u201clife pulsated unconscious,\u201d where \u201cpulsated\u201d well shows repeated movement. The \u201cwater, dense [and] deep\u201d asked about in \u1e5ag-veda<\/i> 10.129.1d may be compared with \u201cthe slumbering waters of life\u201d that darkness breathes over in Book of Dzyan 3.2, called in 3.3 \u201cthe mother deep.\u201d<\/p>\n
RV 10.129.2<\/b>. There was not death nor life (\u201cnon-death\u201d) then. There was no distinguishing sign of night [or] of day. That one breathed without air by [its] inherent power. Other than just that, there was not anything else.<\/p>\n
\u201cBook of Dzyan,\u201d stanza 2, \u015bloka 2: \u201c. . . No, there was neither silence nor sound; naught save ceaseless eternal breath, which knows itself not.\u201d<\/p>\n
According to The Secret Doctrine<\/i>, \u201cThe Great Breath\u201d is \u201cabsolute Abstract Motion\u201d (vol. 1, p. 14), which along with \u201cabsolute abstract Space\u201d are the two aspects under which the one ultimate principle is symbolized. This breath or motion, the eternal cause, can also be described as force (SD 1.93 fn., speaking of the eternal nid\u0101na or cause, the Oi-Ha-Hou): \u201c. . . it is a term to denote the ceaseless and eternal Cosmic Motion; or rather the Force that moves it, which Force is tacitly accepted as the Deity but never named. It is the eternal k\u0101ra\u1e47a, the ever-acting Cause.\u201d This motion or force can also be described as svabh\u0101va, something\u2019s \u201cinherent nature\u201d (The Mahatma Letters<\/i>, #22, 3rd ed. p. 136): \u201cTheir plastic, invisible, eternal, omnipresent and unconscious svabh\u0101va is Force or Motion<\/i> ever generating its electricity which is life.\u201d The svadh\u0101, \u201cinherent power\u201d or force by which \u201cthat one\u201d breathed without air in \u1e5ag-veda<\/i> 10.129.2c, is apparently the svabh\u0101va or \u201cinherent nature\u201d of \u201cthat one.\u201d<\/p>\n
RV 10.129.3<\/b>. Darkness was hidden by darkness in the beginning. All this was water without distinguishing sign. That one germ which was covered by the void was born through the power of heat.<\/p>\n
\u201cBook of Dzyan,\u201d stanza 1, \u015bloka 5: \u201cDarkness alone filled the boundless all, for father, mother and son were once more one, . . .\u201d; 2.3: \u201cThe hour had not yet struck; the ray had not yet flashed into the germ; . . .\u201d; 2.5: \u201c. . . Darkness alone was Father-Mother, svabh\u0101va; and svabh\u0101va was in darkness.\u201d; 2.6: \u201cThese two are the Germ, and the Germ is one. . . .\u201d; 3.2: \u201cThe vibration sweeps along, touching with its swift wing the whole universe, and the germ that dwelleth in darkness: the darkness that breathes over the slumbering waters of life.\u201d; 3.3: \u201cDarkness radiates light, and light drops one solitary ray into the waters, into the mother deep. The ray shoots through the virgin egg; the ray causes the eternal egg to thrill, and drop the non-eternal germ, which condenses into the world-egg.\u201d<\/p>\n
To this we may add a quotation from the \u201cOccult Catechism,\u201d cited in The Secret Doctrine<\/i>, vol. 1, p. 11: \u201cWhat is it that ever is?\u201d \u201cSpace, the eternal aupap\u0101duka (\u201cparentless\u201d).\u201d \u201cWhat is it that ever was?\u201d \u201cThe Germ in the Root.\u201d \u201cWhat is it that is ever coming and going?\u201d \u201cThe Great Breath.\u201d \u201cThen, there are three Eternals?\u201d \u201cNo, the three are one. That which ever is is one, that which ever was is one, that which is ever being and becoming is also one: and this is Space.\u201d This goes along with Book of Dzyan 3.8: \u201cWhere was the germ, and where was now darkness? Where is the spirit of the flame that burns in thy lamp, oh Lanoo? The germ is that, and that is light; the white brilliant son of the dark hidden father.\u201d<\/p>\n
The parallels with darkness and the germ are self-evident. The \u201cwater without distinguishing sign\u201d spoken of here in \u1e5ag-veda<\/i> 10.129.3b, \u201cAll this was water without distinguishing sign,\u201d may be compared with \u201cthe great dark waters\u201d in Book of Dzyan 3.7, \u201cBright Space Son of Dark Space, which emerges from the depths of the great dark waters,\u201d as opposed to \u201cthe great waters\u201d at the end of that stanza that are manifested. In the Book of Dzyan it is light rather than the closely related heat in \u1e5ag-veda<\/i> 10.129.3d that produces the cosmos. But in Book of Dzyan 3.6 light is heat, \u201c. . . radiant light, which was fire, and heat, and motion,\u201d and in 3.9 light produces heat, which in turn yields the manifested water: \u201cLight is cold flame, and flame is fire, and fire produces heat, which yields water: the water of life in the great mother.\u201d The manifested water symbolizes manifested matter (SD 1.82), which constitutes the manifested cosmos.<\/p>\n
RV 10.129.4<\/b>. Desire in the beginning came upon that [germ], which was the first seed of mind. Sages, having searched in the heart with inspired thought, found out [desire to be] the link of the existent in the non-existent.<\/p>\n
The parallel of \u201cdesire\u201d (k\u0101ma) here in this cosmogonic hymn to Eros in the Greek cosmogony has long been noted by Vedic scholars. In The Secret Doctrine<\/i>, what is parallel to Eros is the otherwise unknown Fohat (vol. 1, p. 109). Fohat is there described as \u201cthe mysterious link between Mind and Matter\u201d (1.16). \u201cFohat, in his capacity of Divine Love (Eros<\/i>), the electric Power of affinity and sympathy, is shown allegorically as trying to bring the pure Spirit, the Ray inseparable from the ONE absolute, into union with the Soul, the two constituting in Man the Monad, and in Nature the first link between the ever unconditioned and the manifested\u201d (1.119). This is apparently what the sages found out desire to be in \u1e5ag-veda<\/i> 10.129.4, \u201cthe link of the existent in the non-existent.\u201d How Fohat or desire functions as the link between the non-existent or ever unconditioned and the existent or manifested is poetically pictured in Book of Dzyan 3.12: \u201cThen svabh\u0101va sends Fohat to harden the atoms. . . .\u201d<\/p>\n
RV 10.129.5<\/b>. Their cord was extended across. Was there a below? Was there an above? There were seed-placers, there were powers; inherent power below, impulse above.<\/p>\n
\u201cBook of Dzyan,\u201d stanza 3, \u015bloka 7: \u201c. . . Behold him lifting the veil and unfurling it from east to west. He shuts out the above, and leaves the below to be seen as the great illusion. . . .\u201d<\/p>\n
RV 10.129.6<\/b>. Who really knows? Who here can say? From where has [it] been born? From where [has come] this manifestation? The gods are later than the manifestation of this [cosmos]. Then who knows from what [it] has come into being?<\/p>\n
RV 10.129.7<\/b>. From what this manifestation has come into being, whether [it] was made or whether not, its overseer who is in the highest heaven, he surely knows; or else [he] knows not.<\/p>\n
As I hope will be obvious to all who read this, there are close parallels between \u1e5ag-veda<\/i> 10.129 and the Book of Dzyan; e.g., what is neither non-existent nor existent, its breathing, darkness, etc. It is true that Blavatsky had access to the anonymous translation of \u1e5ag-veda<\/i> 10.129 published by Max M\u00fcller in 1859, and even quoted five of its seven verses in The Secret Doctrine<\/i> facing the opening of the stanzas from the Book of Dzyan. However, a reader not knowing the source of either would far more likely conclude that the brief \u1e5ag-veda<\/i> 10.129 was derived from the extensive stanzas of the Book of Dzyan than that the latter were elaborated from \u1e5ag-veda<\/i> 10.129.<\/p>\n
Now, what can be gained by this comparison? The fact is that the meanings of many Vedic words given in our European language Sanskrit dictionaries are guesses, and likewise the meanings of many Vedic words given in the S\u0101ya\u1e47a Sanskrit commentaries on the Vedas are also guesses. Comparison with the Book of Dzyan clarifies some of these meanings, providing a new source of information that is no less helpful than guesses based on context or guesses based on late Indian tradition. Conversely, comparison with \u1e5ag-veda<\/i> 10.129 shows us the oldest known formulation of what are obviously many of the very same ideas. These ideas, according to ancient Indian tradition, are not the speculations of fledgling philosophers, but rather are the result of the direct spiritual vision of advanced sages, coming down to us from an age of truth.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Part 3: Comparison of \u1e5ag-veda 10.129 with the Book of Dzyan Now that we have what I consider to be an adequate basis for comparison, with the translation choices and the reasons for them explained at length, we may proceed with the comparison of \u1e5ag-veda 10.129 with the Book of Dzyan. We should keep in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-627","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-creation-stories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/627","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=627"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/627\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":630,"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/627\/revisions\/630"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=627"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=627"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/prajnaquest.fr\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=627"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}